Announcing VideoPress.com

We’ve been busy lately here at WordPress.com — we’ve had an announcement of a new or updated feature for you every day this week. Today, you’re getting a two-fer!

Earlier this week, we announced VideoPress, the great new video feature for WordPress.com. Now VideoPress has its own home on the web at VideoPress.com. We’ve also got a great video introduction created by our company auteur Michael Pick, so be sure to head over and check it out. We’ll be continuing to add features to VideoPress, including support for WordPress.org users, so stay tuned to VideoPress for all the latest.

P.S. If you’re a design geek like me, you might be interested to know that the VideoPress logo (as well as all of VideoPress.com) is set in the beautiful Museo family of typefaces, designed by your fellow WordPress.com bloggers at the exljbris Font Foundry (exljbris.wordpress.com).

Email Newsletter

Missing out on the latest WordPress.com developments? Enter your email below to receive future announcements direct to your inbox. An email confirmation will be sent before you will start receiving notifications - please check your spam folder if you don't receive this.

One aspect of video that I believe could be genuinely useful but which has, so far, failed to take off because of lousy implementations, is video commenting. The main players are Viddler and Seesmic, who are no integrated into Automattic-owned Intense Debate, so, I imagine that will be a WordPress.com option at some point. The big problem with both Viddler and Seesmic’s version of video commenting is that they required you to register with them before you could leave a comment. In general, people are reluctant to plow through yet another registration, so, this crippled the whole idea before it had a chance to gain momentum.

One company that do it right are Riffly, whose excellent plugin is in the WordPress repository, and who do not put the barrier of having to register between your users and making their first video comment. They are, however, a pretty small company, they are not going to be able to get video commenting rolling on their own, it would be good to see it offered as an aspect of VideoPress.

Video commenting is not for everyone and should not be seen as an attempt to replace written comments, the vast majority of comments are more suited to text, for very specific types of comment, video can be perfect, we should not neglect the potential if the technology is possible. Personally, I do not have a need for VideoPress as currently offered but would happily pay $60 per year if I could offer my users reliable, easy, one-button video commenting. The conventional wisdom is that video commenting has failed but I suspect that a lot of people, like me, would like to see Automattic keep it simple and do it properly as part of VideoPress.

another great thing… you guys are really the best… and I’ve been notcing other stuff that have been changed around here… like site privew, and the wordpress.com and wordpress.org’s icon….
good job keep being the best 😉

I just went to take a look at it! The upgrade is a must for any blogger who makes podcasts and videos. I just wish it did not cost $60…. does this mean you guys are not going to support other video services on wordpress like vimeo? I have a few videos in HD on vimeo that I would love to have on my blog!

Not at all! We think VideoPress is pretty swanky, but we already support many others including Vimeo. Take a look at the VideoPress Support page; you’ll find a bevy of supported video sites in the blue box titled “Related” (here’s a direct link to instructions for Vimeo.)

My only concern is that it is going to cost me more to do something I was already doing with my space upgrade. The extra cost makes it just as cheap for me to go out and get my own hosting and design from scrap for my blogs.

As Matt M. mentioned in the VideoPress announcement, we’ve given a free year of VideoPress to anyone who had been using videos with their space upgrade. So now you’ve got a year to see how you like it!

And don’t forget the cost of bandwidth if your video becomes the next big thing. 🙂

This is really great, but I’m concerned about something… I had just purchased ($20) a space upgrade in April so I could load videos on my blog. One month later I need to spend another $60 to continue? I’m sure you’ve got some kind of solution worked out right?

If you’d been using your space upgrade for videos prior to the VideoPress announcement, you should have received an email giving you a one-year free subscription to the VideoPress upgrade as seen on the Space Upgrade support page. If not, just contact support and they’ll help you out.

Looking forward to trying this on some video rich projects. Most of the cost is bandwidth which outside the US is extremely expensive so most sites trade down on quality but this new service opens up new possibilities.

On the stats side / perhaps we could compare with the approach used by tubemogul. If we can match that it’s a winner.

Forgive me for asking a potentially redundant question – I did do some looking around and couldn’t find an answer. Does this new feature also support audio podcasting? Can I upload .mp3 files here? I would love this feature and would be gladly pay for it. Thanks.